Sony Xperia Z Ultra- The Best Phone You Will Never Have?

Sony is at it again! This time round they have shaken the market with the massive and stylish Sony Xperia Z ultra phone. Okay, the debate still ranges whether it is a phone, tablet, or phablet. At 6.4 inches wide, the Sony Xperia Z ultra is too big to be a phone and too small to be a tablet.  Some people argue that the Xperia Z ultra is too big to be a phablet too. Well, their argument is valid to a certain degree having in mind that most phablets (Note 3, One Max) are 5.6 to 5.9 inches wide. Forget the argument of phone, tablet or phablet, the Xperia Z ultra is one powerful of a device. It’s specs are close to stunning if not stunning.

Display

Coming in at a breathtaking 6.4 inches, the Xperia Z ultra is one of the largest displays you will bump into. It falls short of the Nexus 10 and Sony Xperia Tablet Z when it comes to the resolution since Sony decided to stop at 1080p for reasons still unclear to me. For a high end device, I expected Sony to go beyond 1080p and perhaps make it ROKO but instead they opted to stick to the ‘tested’ resolution. It’s Triluminos feature and the X Reality engine combined with 334 pixels per inch, makes this display an envy for most phones out there. Playing movies and games on the Xperia Z ultra is awesome as long as you are indoors or the sun is not bright. Sony should have done something to the on-screen brightness. Guess what? The screen responds to touches from several metal surfaces (keys, back of a pen etc.)

Performance

Now this is mind blowing. Its predecessor was running the Qualcomm MDM9215M / APQ8064 chipset and a Quad-core 1.5 GHz Krait CPU. The Xperia Z ultra goes a step further. Under the hood we have a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 (MSM8974) chipset and a 2.2GHz quad-core Krait 400 CPU. This supported by a 2GB RAM makes the Xperia Z ultra fast to run applications and fly through the interface. It’s multitasking is superb and way better than the predecessor.

Battery

With such high processing power we expect a short battery life but guise, the 3,050 mAh battery gives you a standby time of up to 790 h on 2G and 820 h on 3G. And a talktime of upto 14h and 16h on 2G and 3G respectively. Imagine having a battery that will give you 120h of music play! On the downside though, the battery is inbuilt. The Xperia Z ultra doesn’t come with a removable back cover. Perhaps to enhance its water and dust proof capabilities. The ultra has a quick charge capability that allows it to charge faster than most devices. Comparing it with other industry giants like the Note II , Note III and Motorola’s Droid Maxx line, the ultra fall short when we consider the battery life especially when gaming (perhaps because of the Bravia mobile engine).

Software

Out of the box it features an android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean OS. Sony has plans to update this software to 4.3 which comes thick with customizations and pre-loaded software. The Xperia Z ultra has not less than 20 apps from the box. It is something which we have seen in most Xperia devices. The good news is that you can uninstall most of them if you don’t need them. One key addition to the Xperia Z ultra is the ability to connect your PS3 game controller to the phone. Imagine what you would do with a PS3 game controller on your phone. You still get to enjoy the famous Walkman app and a couple of smaller branded apps.

Camera

I am not particularly pleased with its camera simply because it lacks an LED flash diode. Anyways I can accommodate that since most tablets don’t have a flash either. The ultra is packed with 8MP 3264*2448 pixels Exmor R sensor complete with Geo-tagging, face detection, image stabilization, touch  focus, sweep panorama and HDR. The Ultra can take 1080p videos at 30fps both with the primary and it’s a 2MP secondary camera. I would term this as a downgrade when comparing it with its predecessor the Xperia Z which is packed with a 13.1 MP (4128×3096 pixels) and LED flash camera. Sony has maintained the old UI present in earlier Xperia models. They have however added several different shooting modes which feature the Superior Auto mode that dynamically picks the most ideal settings depending on; what you are trying to shoot, the lighting, your location among other factors. The camera is ideal to shoot in open, bright places. However, it is very poor in low light conditions. The night mode tries its best to pick extra light resulting in some bright, blurry shots. The bottom line is, They should have included  a flash.

Pricing

Well, I told you this is the best phone you might never have… You will have to part-away with a whooping £800+ at Amazon UK. Okay, convert it to dollars and you will know what I mean. I love this phone very much but I am weary of the pricing. The Galaxy Mega goes for $570 and although it doesn’t come with high-end hardware and software, we already know the Ultra is not for the slim.  I just hope it will live to its ‘ultra’ name and sell several million units.

Well there you have it. The Ultra is a spec laden statement. If you are buying this phone for any other reason other than making a statement, then it will be for its big size because it doesn’t offer anything unique traits from its predecessors apart from its big screen and slim design.

2G Network

• GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900 – all versions

3G Network

• HSDPA 850 / 900 / 1700 / 1900 / 2100 – all versions

4G Network

• LTE 700 / 850 / 900/ 1700 / 1900 / 2100 / 2600 – C6806     LTE 800 / 850 / 900 / 1700 / 1800 / 1900 / 2100 / 2600 – C6833

SIM

• Micro-SIM

Dimensions

• 179.4 x 92.2 x 6.5 mm (7.06 x 3.63 x 0.26 in)

Weight

• 212 g (7.48 oz)

Display type

• Capacitive touchscreen, 16M colors, Size    1080 x 1920 pixels, 6.4 inches (~344ppi pixel density)
• Multitouch of up to 10 fingers
• Protection Shatterproof and scratch-resistant glass
•  Triluminos display

Sound

• Alert types      Vibration
• MP3 ringtones
• Loudspeaker
• 3.5mm jack

Memory

• Card slot MicroSD, up to 64 GB
• Internal    16 GB, 2 GB RAM

Data

• GPRS  Up to 107 kbps
• EDGE  Up to 296 kbps
• HSDPA, 42 Mbps
• HSUPA, 5.8 Mbps
• LTE, Cat4, 50 Mbps
• UL, 150 Mbps DL

WLAN

• Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac
• dual-band
• Wi-Fi Direct
• DLNA
• Wi-Fi hotspot

Bluetooth

• v4.0 with A2DP

NFC

• Yes

USB

• microUSB v2.0 (MHL), USB On-the-go

Camera

• Primary 8 MP, 3264 x 2448 pixels, autofocus Features    Geo-tagging, touch focus, face detection, image stabilization, HDR, sweep panorama
• Video  Yes, 1080p@30fps, video stabilization, HDR
• Secondary      Yes, 2 MP, 1080p@30fps

OS

• Android OS, v4.2 (Jelly Bean)

Chipset

• Qualcomm MSM8274 or MSM8974 Snapdragon 800

CPU

• Quad-core 2.2 GHz Krait 400

GPU

• Adreno 330

Sensors

• Accelerometer, gyro, proximity, compass

Others

• Radio  Stereo FM radio with RDS
• GPS with A-GPS support and GLONASS
• Java via Java MIDP emulator
• Colors Black, White, Purple
• SNS integration
• TV-out (via MHL A/V link)
• Active noise cancellation with dedicated mic
• DivX/Xvid/MP4/H.263/H.264/WMV player
• MP3/eAAC+/WMA/WAV/Flash player
•  Document viewer
• Photo viewer/editor

Battery

• Non-removable Li-Ion 3050 mAh battery
• Stand-by   Up to 790 h (2G) / Up to 820 h (3G)
• Talk time  Up to 14 h (2G) / Up to 16 h (3G)
• Music play      Up to 120 hMISC

Buy Sony Xperia Z Ultra C6802 Factory Unlocked  on Amazon.